おばけ宇宙大戦争 (Obake Uchu Dai Senso) by 水木しげる (Shigeru Mizuki) (Poplar) ~Ernie Hoyt *Japanese Text Only

As I have mentioned in a previous review, I often read books in the Japanese language to improve my kanji character understanding and reading skill. The local city library sponsored a book recycling event and I took home five books. 

During my elementary school years (1st grade through 4th grade), our family lived in a housing annex for American military families living in Japan. We lived in a place called Narimasu in Itabashi Ward in Tokyo. As you can imagine, my older brother and I didn’t grow up with American superheroes like Superman or Batman and we didn’t get a chance to watch any American cartoons. 

My brother and I were big fans of Japanese cartoons. In the seventies, many of the titles were sports-related - Kyojin no Hoshi (baseball), Ashita no Jo (boxing), Tiger Mask (wrestling), and Attack No.1 (volleyball), were some of the anime series we watched. However, there was one cartoon which was very Japanese in content. That series was titled ゲゲゲの鬼太郎 (GeGeGe no Kitaro). Almost all of the anime series were adapted from manga of the same name. 

GeGeGe no Kitaro was written by Shigeru Mizuki. Osamu Tezuka may be considered the “Godfather of Manga” but Shigeru Mizuki is the manga artist who popularized and revived Japan’s yokai culture. Yokai are supernatural creatures and spirits in Japanese folklore. 

おばけ宇宙大戦争 (Obake Uchu Dai Senso) which literally translates into English as Ghost Space War is the fourth book of twelve in Shigeru Mizuki’s series おばけ学校 (Obake Gakko) - Ghost School series in English. All the books feature GeGeGe no Kitaro and friends. 

GeGeGe no Kitaro or simply Kitaro is the main character. He is a yokai boy who was born in a cemetery after his parent’s death. Besides his mostly-decayed father, he is the last surviving member of the Ghost Tribe or Yokai Tribe. His father, Medama-Oyaji is an eyeball with a full body that can also speak. 

Kitaro’s friends include Neko Musume (Cat Girl), Nezumi Otoko (Rat Boy), Sunakake-Babaa (Sand-Throwing Hag), Konaki-Jijii (Crybaby Geezer), Ittan-Momen (Roll of Cotton), and Nurikabe (Plastered Wall). They all help Kitaro protect humans against evil yokai and others. 

The main story of this book is about a UFO queen who wants to take over Earth. She looks nearly human but her minions squids with more legs. Her large spaceship is hovering over Tokyo. An egg-like item was dropped from the ship and when it hit the ground it released a smell so bad that the entire population of Tokyo's cats disappeared. 

Many yokai gathered at Kitaro’s house and told him that he needs to do something about it or life would become inconvient for all of them. Kitaro agreed that that would be a big problem and set off to counter the UFO Queen’s attack. 

The Queen became aware that Kitaro was the leader of the yokai. She ordered her minions to use their secret weapon on him - a hallucination bomb. He then saw his friends Sunakake-Babaa and Konaki-Jijii. They told him that Kitaro was in alliance with the UFO Queen and that he was here to attack humans. The hallucination bomb clouds gathered around Kitaro and stuck a “transformation nail” in his head. Kitaro had now become a slave to the UFO Queen. Not only that, Kitaro’s friends discover there is another group of aliens invading Earth. Are they here to help the Queen or are they going to help the humans?

Will the world be taken over by the UFO Queen? Will Kitaro’s friends be able to save Kitaro from being a slave? Your guess is as good as mine. 

The book includes a second story titled Neko Machi Kippu. In this story Kitaro and Nezumi-Otoko take a part-time job with Neko-Hakase (Cat Professor) to help him find out why when unknown humans increase, the more cats there are.  

I’ve always believed that you do not have to be a child to enjoy children’s books. I still believe that today which is why I enjoy reading books such as these.